Saturday, April 19, 2014

Live At Corvallis High School, For One Night Only

In every way possible
for young men in love with women, it was our dream gig:the chance for our band, cryptically named Time After Time, composed of mostly
Notre Dame (all boys) High School students to play a concert for the annual
barbecue at our all-girls sister school, Our Lady of Corvallis.There was Mike the sax player, John the
drummer, Bill the guitarist, me on keyboards, and Paul, he of flowing rocker
hair, the oldest member and only non-N.D. student, on bass.All those girls would be waiting for us and
we’d take the stage with our modern jazz playlist, jamming live, for one night,
or late afternoon, only.

It is inexplicable now
across the years why, with all those Catholic school girls we hoped would be in
the audience, that I needed to bring a date, but I did.Carol and I had grown up together through
elementary school only to separate when we hit ninth grade; she went to public
and I continued on into Catholic high school.She was petite with brown hair and a dash of freckles, quiet and
smoldering in a way I didn’t understand at the time.We’d never, despite my best efforts, moved
beyond the friendship stage, but I hoped if she saw me play keyboards with the
band, she would fall into my arms and everything would change.

When we kicked off our
set that afternoon, Carol was seated with my grandmother at a table near the
stage.My grandmother usually came to
all of our gigs and often let us rehearse in her backyard, although she did not
want the guys to use the bathroom because, as she put it, “You don’t know where
they’ve been.”We weren’t exactly rowdy
metal rockers, except maybe for Paul, but we managed to sneak in to relieve
ourselves when she was occupied elsewhere in the house.I was not embarrassed at all having a senior
citizen and close relative be our main groupie, and I was happy Carol had
someone to keep her company while I was up on stage.

The crowd was a little
confused by us.We weren’t a rock band,
and our jazz arrangements cribbed from the bands we watched play in clubs around L.A. were mostly unknown to the audience of girls and their families.Mid-set, in response to a girl who caught his
eye, our saxophonist, Mike, wandered off the stage to follow her to some secluded
location.We continued to play on.When I looked over at Carol, she looked
bored.

Eventually, Mike
returned and we finished our set to tepid applause.Since our performance did not generate the
rabid response we’d hoped for, we packed up and reconvened at a pizza restaurant
near the Studio City campus to review our set and console ourselves.Carol remained aloof and cool with me even as
I made sure she got the pizza she wanted and plenty to drink.Deep down, I knew this would probably be it
for us because we just didn’t click.It
was weird because although we had been friends for years, we knew little about
each other’s life.She never told me
about school.I only knew that she was
in all honors classes and was considered one of the brightest kids in her
science program.To me, she seemed
always somewhere else and when we did talk, she was obviously more worldly and experienced
in life than I was, and I think she looked down on me as a sheltered Catholic
school boy.During our pizza feast, she
said little as we all ate and discussed the show.

Mike, ever the ladies’
man and also the craziest of us, made jokes and kept us entertained.His nickname in the band was “Weed,” for
obvious reasons.Carol laughed at his
antics and although she seemed to be ignoring me, she liked Mike, and it was
clear he was performing for her.I got
up to get us another pitcher of Coke and when I returned, Mike had slid over
next to Carol in the booth effectively blocking me from my date.He was whispering into her ear while she
giggled and blushed.I demanded that
Mike get out of my seat, but he refused leaving me to try to save face by
acting like I didn’t care.I slid into
the booth opposite them and tried to make small talk with the others while Mike
and Carol groped each other under the table.

By the time we were
all ready to call it a day, I was hissing steam out of my ears.Mike pulled me aside while Carol went to the
bathroom.“Listen, dude, I’m sorry but
she really digs me,” he said, as if this were the most logical and ethical conclusion.“If you want, I’ll take her home and save you
the gas.”

So generous an offer,
but I was having none of it.“Forget it,”
I snapped.

“Forget what?” Carol
asked as she rejoined our group in the parking lot.

“Why don’t you let her
decide, dude,” Mike said with his crooked grin.He was tall with blond hair that hung seductively in his eyes.Carol nestled under his arm and stared at me with
defiance.

“I’m taking her home,”
I said evenly.I didn’t want to take her
home at this point, but to let it go meant admitting defeat and our parents
were good friends.I was sure Carol’s
mother would call and complain to my parents if she returned home with a
stranger.Plus, I was sure they would
not be going straight home, and I did not want to think about what they might be
up to in some vacant parking lot somewhere.I did not know Carol, I was coming to understand, but I knew Mike and
what he was capable of with a willing partner.

Carol gave me a
hateful look and then turned to kiss Mike deeply on the mouth.Tongues intertwined, and out of disgust, I
turned away and started walking to my car.“Call me,” I heard Carol say before she followed me.

On the freeway going
home, Carol maintained a vow of silence.I was so angry the blood was pounding in my head.I left the radio off and let my anger build,
mile after mile across the San Fernando Valley.Up ahead in the hills, a brush fire had broken out and we could see the
flames leaping into the night sky giving the horizon a bruised, orange and purple
tint.The tension in the car was
unbearable.“I guess it’s a brush fire,”
I offered lamely.

Carol did not reply
and kept staring out the passenger window.I glanced at the rearview mirror; it would not surprise me to find Mike
behind us.I’m sure Carol hoped he was.

I let her out at the
curb with a curt “Goodbye.”

“Bye,” she replied,
slamming the door.

I never dated her
again, and saw her only once or twice again before we drifted out of each other’s
life.Our families also went their
separate ways.I did see her older
sister once in college, and she told me, without elaboration, that Carol had “issues”
but was trying to work them out.I didn’t
care enough to ask for more information.

Our band eventually
broke up.Mike became an insurance
executive.Our drummer now lives in the Bay
Area and plays in a Star Trek-themed punk rock band.Our guitarist works for the Los Angeles
Archdiocese and teaches theology at Loyola Marymount University.The bass player, who had that long, gorgeous
glam-rock hair, went on to join the punk group Bad Religion.

All of this goes to
say, our lives moved on, and to a greater or lesser extent, music became a hobby
or a distant memory for us.

Our Lady of Corvallis
High School graduated its last class in the 1980s.The closed campus existed as a movie set for
a while before becoming a satellite school for a Japanese university.Currently, it is back to being a private
school, although a non-Catholic one.Notre Dame High School, my alma mater, went co-ed shortly before
Corvallis closed, which many believed hastened the demise of our sister school.

Corvallis was also my
wife’s high school.I knew her during
our teenage years and I actually saw her the day we played our one and only gig
on campus.Years later, after we were
married, we were going through boxes of old pictures when I stumbled upon a
number of photos taken at our concert that day, including the one I’ve posted
above.

“Oh my God,” I said
upon finding them, “this is us.My band,
Time After Time.”I was shocked and pleasantly surprised.At least one beautiful woman was into us that
day.

“Oh yeah,” she responded
with an air of nonchalance.“I took them
of that bass player.I loved his
hair.He was hot.”I’m not sure she remembered that I was even
there that day.Unlike Carol, though,
this girl stayed with me and later, agreed to join with me in the holy union of
matrimony.In the end, I got lucky after
all.

1 comment:

Anonymous
said...

What a great read. If there was ever a metric for gauging the quality of one's life, I think it would be the number of stories that one is able to weave into an engaging tapestry - a tapestry that permanently hangs upon the walls of the local museum, frequented by friends and family and everyone in between. For all our sakes, keep on weaving.

P.S. Some former classmates and I have discussed potentially catching up with you over the summer. Let me know if you're up to it! We all miss you very much.